ASU Baseball: Struggles continue in series opener at UCLA

It was not a good day at the yard on Friday night as Arizona State baseball (20-23, 9-10 Pac-12) dropped its third-straight game (in three different stadiums). The 19-2 loss to No. 13-ranked UCLA (29-13, 13-7) will keep ASU at seventh in the conference standings at the moment (the top eight teams will play in the Pac-12 Tournament at the end of May).

Starting pitcher Adam Tulloch was steady through four innings, but gave up four runs in his fifth inning of work. He finished the night with six earned runs and seven strikeouts.

After Tulloch came Jacob Walker, Andrew Lucas and Danny Marshall who were all used in the sixth (you can see where this is going). It was a 13-run sixth for the Bruins where UCLA batted around twice in the frame.

Only six of the 13 runs were earned, as the Sun Devils had three errors in the inning and a handful of plays that were ruled hits but could have gone the other way.

In an attempt to save arms, position players Will Rogers and Ethan Long threw scoreless seventh and eighth innings, respectively. Rogers racked up two strikeouts.

On offense, ASU struggled and UCLA starter Max Rajcic was dominant. He was taken out with one out in the ninth after 103 pitches and 11 strikeouts. The Sun Devils only had three hits on the night against Rajcic.

The two runs for ASU came in the top of ninth when Joe Lampe doubled and scored Alex Champagne. Lampe would come around to score when Bronson Balholm grounded out to first.

In their last three games, the Sun Devils have been outscored by their opponents 42-7. They will look to get back on track with a quick turnaround. Game two of the series will be at 2 p.m. local time.